


A Letter From an Otherwise Straight Man

by CHEVY_IMPALA_1967



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Letters, M/M, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-01
Updated: 2015-04-01
Packaged: 2018-03-20 17:47:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3659460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CHEVY_IMPALA_1967/pseuds/CHEVY_IMPALA_1967
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That’s why I found myself in unfamiliar territory when I — the open guy, the “figured out” guy, the unquestionably straight guy — realized that I was in love with my best friend, a man. A man I had known for seven years. A man I had never before even thought of in a romantic way. But, there I was, in love with an angel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Letter From an Otherwise Straight Man

**Author's Note:**

> Based off of this article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/29/straight-man-gay-love-_n_5737618.html?
> 
> Happy April Fools Day, nerds.

I’ve always prided myself on being open. I’ve been to hell and back and everywhere inbetween — literally. I’ve seen Leviathan and demons. I’ve met my future self. I’ve prayed to God and ran wild with the things down below. I knew who I was, without a doubt. I'm a hunter.

That’s why I found myself in unfamiliar territory when I — the open guy, the “figured out” guy, the unquestionably straight guy — realized that I was in love with my best friend, a man. A man I had known for seven years. A man I had never before even thought of in a romantic way. But, there I was, in love with an angel.

Only it didn’t start out as love. See, seven years ago, I made a deal. Not the business kind. Not even the game show kind. This was the kind where you vomit massive amounts of blood throughout the day. The kind that ends with a blade in your back. The kind where you’re bent over in pain with tears in your new black eyes. I sold my soul for my brother.

And this angel, Castiel, a complete fucking stranger, took pity on me. He "gripped me tight and rose me from Perdition" or whatever. He lifted my heavy ass out of Hell. He pieced my body back together. He fixed what he could of my fucked up soul. He’d even stuck around afterward.

Each day after, I cautiously watched him when he came down from Heaven. Gradually, my face lit up when he flew downstairs without me calling. I replayed conversations we had when I was alone. I missed him when he was gone.

Two years into this routine, I had a thought — a tiny, offhand thought — that I loved him. It seemed like a joke. It seemed impossible. I pushed it away immediately. But that thought started creeping into my mind whenever he was away. That thought sneaked in whenever he did something utterly him or made me laugh.

And it all came down to this moment — one moment when his blade smacked against my head in a steady tempo and those big, blue eyes found mine with a little bit of fear and recognition in them. I knew this was it. This was the moment where I had to decide if I could allow myself to love a man against everything I had previously known about myself. This was the moment when I had to decide if I was going to take a step forward into this crazy idea of telling my best friend that I loved him.

There’s a certain freedom in a daily dose of life-threatening hunting. There’s a certain liberation in staring down Death in the eye over Chicago style pizza. It makes you do crazy things. It makes you unafraid to tear down the only identity you’ve ever known for a gamble. It makes you walk right up to your best friend and tell him that you love him.

So I reached for him cautiously. I could hear my heart beating in my ears. I opened my mouth and no words came out. Again, I tried, and all I could say was, “Cas, buddy.”

His eyes were dead.

“We're family. We need you.”

His expression cracked in the very slightest.

“I need you." I know it's those words, those three everyone wants to hear. But, if I’ve ever felt love, this is it. And, well — I think this enough. He stopped and the pain dulled for a moment. It was a long moment. Then his hand caressed my face and I thought for a second he was going to end it there.

He didn't. My broken bones and cuts mended and he flitted off with some bullshit excuse of protecting the angel tablet. We didn't talk about it again fo another few years, again on the brink of death.

“Do you truly miss my presence that much?” Cas asked one particular day when the Mark of Cain burned slow and soft like a candle. I nodded, though I didn't know how he could tell that much. His expression softened.

"And when I return, does your heart rate increase?" 

I nodded again, this time with a hint of uncertainty.

He looked back timidly, clumsy with the idea of emotions and humanity. He stumbled on his next words “Well, then I think I might love you too.”

We had no idea how to make this work. An ex-angel and an ex-Knight of Hell? We had no idea if this even could work. Sometimes we still don’t. It took time — years even — to figure it out. Most of our serious talks were at the end of a blade and covered in blood, but we made it work. None of us know what we’re doing. We just try and negotiate and compromise. And, little by little, you become just another boring couple. Well, maybe not us.

So, yes, I’m an otherwise straight man in love with a man. But I would never reduce Castiel down to just being a man. Because he’s more than that. He’s rebellious and an animal lover and a colossal dork. And I love him for all of those reasons and so many more. I love him for who he is, not what he is. We’re more than our gender. We're more than our _species_. We’re more than one attribute. And sometimes we need to remember that.

We have this myth of identity — that who we are is the summation of a lot of choices we made in the past. That we’ve got a map for the life we’re supposed to lead, and we’ve got to stick to it. But that’s assuming that we’re all static beings, and that’s not how people work at all. If it were, I'd still be my father's soldier and my brother would be at Stanford. Maybe everything would be better, but we wouldn't be us.

In every moment, we’re changing and evolving and growing. In every moment, we’re reconstructing our identity. We’re not defined by our decisions from two years ago. We’re not even defined by our decisions from two minutes ago. We’re defined by who we choose to be in this very moment.

We’ll never be “figured out.” Over the course of our lives, we’ll constantly be transforming into a more and more authentic version of ourselves. Our preferences will change. Our passions will change. Some of us will choose cake, pie, or both. And we have to be brave enough to choose the thing that makes up happiest in each individual moment.

When I chose to tell Castiel that I loved him, it didn’t matter if it didn’t fit my identity. It didn’t matter if it didn’t fit my sexuality. It just mattered if it brought me love. In truth, that’s all that ever really matters. We’re only here for a very short time. In every moment, we only have one real choice: Will it bring me closer to or further away from love?

So, tell me — will you choose love?


End file.
